"Say I won't fail her; but I entreat that you soon let me know the result of the meeting."
"I'll come in," assented the doctor, as he hastily departed. Then he added sotto voce, "If you hear anything more under twelve or fifteen hours, I'm off my reckoning."
Re-entering the carriage, he was driven rapidly to the hotel. Jackson had played his part, and had easily induced Nichol to recount his hospital experience in the presence of his parents, who listened in mingled wonder, grief, and impotent protest.
"Captain, put on your overcoat and hat and come with me," said the doctor, briskly. "Your father and mother will go with us."
"Good-by, Jackson," said Nichol, cordially. "Ye're a lively cuss, en I hopes we'll have a chaince to chin agin."
With a blending of hope and of fear, his parents followed him. The terrible truth of his sensibility to all that he should recognize and remember became only the more appalling as they comprehended it. While it lost none of its strangeness, they were compelled to face and to accept it as they could not do at first.
"Now, Captain," said the doctor, after they were seated in the carriage, "listen carefully to me. It is necessary that you recall what happened before you were wounded. I tell you that you must do it if you can, and you know doctors must be obeyed."
"Look yere, Doctor, ain't I a-tryin'? but I tell yer hit's like tryin' ter lift myself out o' my own boots."
"Mind, now, I don't say you must remember, only try your best. You can do that?"
"I reckon."